Which operating system are you using?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Crypton, Oct 11, 2010.

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  1. Charonte

    Charonte Member

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    ZeroBot, why can't you provide a native linux version? You're just using QT, right? There should be very few (if any) changes needed to make it compile providing you don't rely on windows-specific code...

    You don't have to provide 'support' either, so long as it'll compile and run linux users will most likely be happy as there aren't that many native linux games around. Wine is not a good solution as it's (atleast for the foreseeable future) very bugy and very unstable; there are still certain things it doesn't do right that you'll never 'tweak' out of your program.

    DarkFool, the main reason you don't see as many threads asking for WINE support is because they either post on the wine forums or are able solve it themselves. Windows is mainstream enough that any second rate moron can use it and potentially break something, but linux hasn't quite got there yet (it's mostly a social stigma, actually. But even so)

    In the end it's your choice Zerobot, but I just can't see why you'd be restricting the playerbase like that.
     
  2. arcanumizer

    arcanumizer New Member

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    a native Linux version is the way to go, because predicting the actual users based on current OS usage is faulty logic. it assumes that people will either want to play your game, or not, and then will either be able to or not based on whether you've supported their OS. by that reasoning, of course a native Windows version is the way to go, because Linux users can still play via WINE.

    however...there are millions of Linux users now, and most of us are geeks who've deliberately chosen Linux, rather than random folks who are just using whatever OS their machine came with. games like tux racer and battle for wesnoth have huge user bases, perhaps LARGER than what they'd have if they were produced for Windows and chosen simply because people "want to play" them. they are played *because* they run natively on Linux, and for that reason alone have large numbers of loyal fans. the game you're planning to develop could potentially be the best of its kind among native Linux games, and among the best of all native Linux games. in this situation you could potentially wind up with MORE users than if you write for the enormous Windows crowd with their enormous selection of alternatives (to your game) to play.

    so don't base your decision on predictions of numbers of users. base it on whether you want to write for an OS that is basically malware, or an OS that rocks like a penguin on crack.
     
  3. Xz

    Xz Monkey Admin Staff Member

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    This.

    And this.
     
  4. Crypton

    Crypton Member

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    Guys, but I'm talking about priority, and not about which platforms will or won't be supported.

    In the end, I hope that (almost) every platform will be supported, but you know, its hard to support all linux distros, I'm myself linux user (surely not that much experienced as you are) and I already know that linux is usually more like "finish by yourself", so even I test it on OpenSuse 11.2, it may have problems running on different version, or different distro, like Ubuntu or any other.

    About using cross-platform libraries, I'm not using Qt or any other framework, because I wrote already everything by myself. Its written in way of cross-platform programming (abstract layers, macros), but at this moment, only Windows part is implemented.

    Anyway, thanks for the suggestions, I'll keep them in my mind.

    P.S.: All third party libraries I used are cross-platform already: OpenGL, OpenAL, Lua, FreeType, zlib, nedmalloc.
     
  5. Charonte

    Charonte Member

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    Apologies, I seem to remember talking to you previously about using Qt - glad to see that you changed your mind as it's not really suited for games.

    There's not a great deal of work in compiling for another platform if you're using cross-platform libraries - worst-case scenario is that you have to reboot, log into linux and recompile with few minor changes if you were a little careless when programming (filenames for example; fuck if it matters that much I'll write a bash script for you that'll convert them). If you use something like MingW then you can most likely just set it up to compile a linux binary in Windows.

    The majority of linux users won't care if it's been tested or not, as long as it works in the end we'll most likely be very happy. Re linux distros, I wouldn't worry about it if the listed libraries are all that you're using - these are all very stable and haven't changed a lot in a long time; even if some nut case attempts to use it with 6 year old software (and that's the only practical difference between software on linux distros, their version) it'll most likely be fine and if not it's their problem anyway. Multilib support is so good on linux that you can get away with just a 32bit version if that's what you want (and again, there's no performance bonuses to 64bit ATM).

    Also, what'd you mean by 'only the Windows part is implemented'? I *hope* you don't mean that only the windows-specific code has been added, as that's exactly what you should be avoiding if you plan displaying this as a cross-platform product.

    I'm just not seeing what's hard about compiling a binary for linux at around the same time as a windows one for each major release, if you really want it to run on most OS's the sooner it's out there the better. Then again, I don't have your code in front of me so I can't actually say how difficult it'd be to port.

    I won't go into your mention of macros, as I have a rather strong opinion on the topic that I doubt you'll like to hear :p
     
  6. Crypton

    Crypton Member

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    No need for apologies, you remember correctly, because I was actually using Qt before I wrote my own stuff: http://arcanum.game-alive.com/post/164/


    Thanks for the offer, but I think that won't be a problem, because all source code filenames are lowercased, and contains slash instead of backslash, for example: agate/core/core.hpp. The OpenArcanum's file system also uses same filename format, even when reading dat or zip archive, so I think that its all ready for linux as well.

    I already implemented some stuff for linux, like threads, mutexes and other stuff, but I actually did not yet tested it. Also some stuff is not yet implemented, like x window and glx stuff.

    Macros? oh sorry, I meant "condition inclusions" for cross-platform stuff, like "#ifdef __LINUX #else #endif"

    See you later. :D
     
  7. Charonte

    Charonte Member

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    Oh, threads. Didn't think of that. Personally I wouldn't bother as I don't think they're needed for something like Arcanum (Lua threads would be sufficient if you wanted to have cocurrent execution of objects/scripts).

    Instead of worrying about x window/windows/mac (that might even be X, no idea) you could wrap your window creation code with something like SDL or SFML. They're both cross-platform and will handle window creation quite well; I like SFML better as it's a cleaner design and has a tonne of other utility libraries (such as networking, threads, audio through openAL etc) which are all cross platform as well. Not to mention that the native drawing functions are actually hardware accelerated unlike SDL. It's actually what I'm using now for my project, but none the less it might be of use to you.
     
  8. NightwishFan

    NightwishFan New Member

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    This sounds like a great idea Arcanum on Linux. I do not see why QT would not be good choice as it has native support for bunch of stuff like opengl. Programs like Stellarium are wrote with it. Just not KDE dependencies please! :D

    I also will be happy to help in any way, though as a coder I only know python (sorry) however I am a musician and composer and know my way around *nix systems.

    Using Ubuntu 10.10 here (though thats because I have been with Ubuntu from the start not because I am a noob :D)
     
  9. Crypton

    Crypton Member

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    Surprisingly, I've received a lot of requests for Linux port.

    Decision made: Linux port will be released along with Windows version.

    Also I want to thank to all Linux users who helped to inform other forums and sites about OpenArcanum project. Porting will start as soon as possible.

    Again, thank you very much.

    Have a nice day ;)
     
  10. NightwishFan

    NightwishFan New Member

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    Ah, excellent. If you need any help feel free to ask. I can also assist packaging for Ubuntu and Debian.
     
  11. Mesteut

    Mesteut New Member

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    I use a Windown 7 Home Premium x64 on my laptop, if you still need statistics.
     
  12. alfred123

    alfred123 New Member

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    How do I determine what operating system I'm using?
     
  13. TheDavisChanger

    TheDavisChanger Well-Known Member

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  14. magikot

    magikot Well-Known Member

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    A year dead thread dug up by what appears to be a bot, and you are helpful to it, TDC? :(
     
  15. Charonte

    Charonte Member

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    What if he doesn't have a control panel?
     
  16. Zanza

    Zanza Well-Known Member

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    Then may God have mercy on us all.
     
  17. TheDavisChanger

    TheDavisChanger Well-Known Member

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    I chastise the bot-who-thinks-he-is-a-sentient-game-developer for replying to a three-week old thread and I get a talking to.
    I aid a bought who doesn't know his own software revision and I get a talking to.
    It's hard out here for a pimp.
     
  18. Anodeen

    Anodeen New Member

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    Well, I'm still an XP SP3 user... And I don't want to change it to anything!
     
  19. Smuel

    Smuel Well-Known Member

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    Your name may be anodyne, but your post was not. Prepare to be educated on the rules of this forum. If you survive the process, then you will obtain the privilege of wasting a good proportion of your life on here. Good luck.
     
  20. DarkFool

    DarkFool Nemesis of the Ancients

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    Well written retort. Are you becoming a higher quality of troll, or are you merging into the collective conciousness that is T-A Regulars?
     
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